Dumpster Diving on Park Avenue

Aug. 10, 2010 — -- New Yorkers strolling down ritzy Park Avenue can choose to go for a dip in a dumpster swimming pool this month.

As part of New York City's Summer Streets program, three pools made of the giant trash bins have opened to the public, right near Grand Central Station, available for those interested in cooling off from the summer heat on weekends in August.

Dumpster diving in New York first became popular last summer in Brooklyn, when Macro-Sea, a development company, started hosting secret swimming parties around the borough, setting up the trash bins in vacant lots.

"Last year we took a junkyard in Brooklyn and made kind of a low-fi country club for our friends and we used dumpsters," Macro-Sea president David Belt said. "We tore out the insides and covered it with plastic and tarps and we had filters around the edge and built some decks and we had a great time."

The secret series of dumpster parties became popular enough to get the attention of the New York Times, landing a plum spot on the front page of the paper's arts section.

"The dumpsters turned out to make pretty good pools because of their size and their mobility," Belt said.

The trend also caught the attention of New York City officials, who have now incorporated the dumpster pools into the city's outdoor recreation project, Summer Streets. For the next two Saturdays the city will have three dumpster pools open to the public on the city's famed Park Avenue.

When the city gave Macro-Sea the opportunity to open the pools on the posh avenue, Belt was ecstatic.

"I love the idea that it kind of takes Park Avenue down a couple of notches of pretentiousness, and that you're repurposing Park Avenue just like you'd repurpose a junk yard," he said.

"I really loved the idea of the dumpster pools," Dani Simons, the project coordinator, said. "You hear dumpster and you think one thing, and then you see the pools or you see pictures of them, and it's totally a different thing."

Simons described the pools as an innovative trend in New York City: "It's taking something we're used to seeing in one particular way and really inventing them and using them in this totally creative and new way."

The Park Avenue pools are all made from brand-new dumpsters that never functioned as trash bins. The containers were remodeled into swimmer-friendly oases in the city, complete with decking, showers, and a lounge with cabanas for changing.

"There's furniture around so you can actually chill out and catch a sun tan if you want," Simons said.